The Life: Laura Brown's Adventures in Fashion

For Laura Brown, it's all in the jeans.

As far as I'm concerned, there's nothing in life that can't be done. In jeans. Jeans are my everything. I'm so grateful for jeans that it the clever young German Levi Strauss were alive today, I would take him out for a schnitzel and a stein of Köstritzer Schwarzbier.

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I've always felt my best when I'm in jeans. The way you can walk anywhere in them. The pair, when they're the perfect length for a heel, that make your legs feel seven feet long. The sheer girl-on-the-go-ness of them. While I love the sauciness of a dress, I feel like I'm in character wearing one. (Cue my colleague who, when I swanned into the office in a long Isabel Marant floral, said, "Who are you?") And skirts? They're high-maintenance women on a hanger.

More than any other piece of clothing, jeans have a life. They project confidence—they're Just Enough. They're the gala to the grocery store, the hot date to the hike. When you find the right pair, it's the wardrobe equivalent of the One.

I've been through lots of Ones—when it comes to my denim darlings I'm a serial dater. It started in the late '80s with, as so many do, Calvin Klein. In Calvin Klein, you were Sexy™. Sexy came embedded in every pair, like rivets. Brooke Shields must have flexed on the floor of my subconscious because I fancied myself like those snake-hipped cinematic temptresses, lying down and yanking my jeans up with a coat hanger.

That, for me, never really happened because then came college and, with that, grunge. Those Sexy jeans would never work with my flannel shirt (and freshman, like, 20), so I fell into the classic and roomier legs of the Levi's 501. The 501 girl had it going on too. To me, she was the Peter Lindbergh'd supermodels—Christy, Naomi, Linda—with their black leather jackets, all rolled into one. The jeans didn't quite look like that on me.

I did smile, 20 years later, to see 501s on a rack beside a rainbow of designer denim in the Bazaar fashion closet. It makes me happy to see new jeans, period. New jeans are filled with possibility. And they get it done.

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I'm lucky that I work in fashion, so I have the luxury of wearing jeans to the office. But they still mean business. One of my first imprints of jeans-as-power was Maureen Chiquet, the chic Chanel executive. She wore jeans! All the time! Speaking of the French, editor Emmanuelle Alt works the hell out of them, giving the impression that she's under-thought everything perfectly. (See my next book, French Women: I Still Don't Get It.)

At the moment three brands are speaking to me—even if they're saying, "I'm too tight and you are delusional." Acne, from my Stockhomies, always keeps it interesting and, helpfully, gives the illusion that you're cool. Currently I'm wearing the Pop Vintage, a washed blue pair with the slightest drop crotch (which I love, and I promise I don't resemble Justin Bieber). Then there's Frame, strangely also from the Swedes (what's with them and denim?). My favorite is their Le Skinny de Jeanne, pale-blue skinnies cropped just so at the ankle. Throw on an oversize Equipment shirt and you're ready for business. And, of course, J Brand, which are as cool as they are kind. I've been wearing them for years, from the perfectly flared Love Story to Photo Ready skinny jeans. And they have stretch. Who doesn't want stretch?

So when I put on my jeans, and whether or not I look effortless, I feel it. And isn't that the point?

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